Even though I came back only for the afternoon it was a good change to go back to work, especially because there are things that I need to look at and moreover I can have a social interaction better than using the phone all day. Tomorrow I will go back to Florence waiting for the visit to the orthopedic on Thursday, I will go two days earier as someone from the company has to go to Florence and it's a good chance to go by car...
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Just spent the whole day playing video games and doing some work for the homepage. Today I even managed to walk 4 steps without crutches which was a minor achievement. I can't wait until next Thursday so that I can get some replies from the doctor that I am going to see in Florence...
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Marta has gone for the day to see a friend of her to the mountains, I would have gone there myself but the leg doesn't allow any proper walking and more than everything a 2 hour drive in a crammed car. As a result i have enjoyed a day completely by myself, I actually quite like it it reminds me when I was living in Florence before coming here up north. I always wonder if there is a chance for me to go back to Florence on day, I really miss it beign there... Cooked a splendid Pasta fot lunch, and decided to start a receipe section to this site! :)
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Since I am injured and cannot walk (except with the use of crutches), I have been working from home. The funny thing is that I had proposed to my boss, before I got injured to move back to Florence and do this kind of job from my house. It is working perfectly well actually, I have to thank the people in the office for being so splendid (Marta and Manuela), but generally it's an experiment that is working well. Of course I didn't want to test it this way (broken knee ligaments), but one has to adapt! Apart from this reflection nothing to say, played computer all day, now I am thinking to add a Receipe section to the site, we'll see...
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Didn't do much today, basically just sat at the computer arranging pictures to upload on the site when I can get hold of a non firewalled internet connection faster than my crappy 56k. My attention today was drawn to a construction site that is right next to my house. It never occurred to me on how noisy the workers are, they start sawing, banging, digging and whaterver else they do at 7,00 in the morning. Needless to say I am rather upset, as the leg is rather painful and I cannot properly sleep at night, as a result they wake me up rather early, after all I could sleep until 9:00 or 10:00 AM if I wanted to! I have imagined throwing some rotten eggs at them, in sign of disapproval, but I also thought that since I am temporarily crippled it might not be a great idea, as if they find out I cannot exactely run away...
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Nothing much to report today, I have worked on the homepage all morning and afternoon, hopefully the result will be good. It has been quite a long time since I last programmed in html, fortunately I must have a good memory (or too little to remember), and I didn't take long before I was understanding why that picture wasn't loading or why that sentence is not indented... Oh well, it should be enough to get the blog and the picture sites going, that's the aim of this site anyways.
On the knee front yet no news, I was waiting for a call from my mother as it might be possible that I will have to get it checked in Florence, but she hasn't called yet. Guess I will employ the rest of the afternoon playing some games!
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Yep basically I spent the most of the day over the phone either with the office, my mother or other people. The knee is now set my mum will try to get in touch with the doctor in Florence to see if there is a chance to ger a proper visit with him. At the same time I have called my sister's husband, he's a very good physiotherapist, he gave me some advice and told me to get an ecography of my muscles as they might be badly damaged as well. I am getting so many opinions that I don't even know where to start. Will call the doctor tomorrow and see if he can fix me up with another exam. The knee is still rather painful, I am getting so many different opinions on wether to have surgery or not, I guess that whatever specialist sees this wreckage first will have it his/her way.
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The MRI results are rather bad. Apparently there is a subtotal damage of the anterior cruciate ligament. My GP said that it's the worst injury that could happen because it will prevent me from doing certain types of sport again and I will have to be careful anyways not to break it completely.
He also said that it will not be operated surgically as there in no urgency to this condition, I will be able to walk normally with the ligament torn.
Needless to say that this is not an easy morsel to swallow. Better rest and think about it tomorrow.
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Went out for dinner at Bogio and Paola's house. It was nice to get out of the house again. Knee seems to be swelling again, I suspect that the injury is a serious one, tomorrow I will know.
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Today I went to see the Revenge of the Sith for the second time. I have to say that apart from the nice feeling of getting away from my house, there is no other "good mood" worth of writing of.
I was hoping that the second view of the movie would have unlocked something that I missed during the first, but instead it turned out that I noticed more nasty sides of Episode III than hidden "Easter eggs". I still think that the movie is flawed by the fact that you know what is going to happen, and surely the tech advance done in the 1976 with "New Hope" have not been reproduced in these movies. Special effects are grand, but now I see that I give them for granted. The public needs more; it's a tough challenge for movie makers. All dialogues involving Anakin and Padme are also pretty bad.
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I guess that I was quite lucky yesterday. The doctor came to visit to check the knee out, I got a 20days leave for injury. On the top of that I had to book the MRI to see the extent of the damage. Italian NHS is rather poor, so I was expecting a log wait before getting it checked, but luckily I managed to get the appointment for TODAY!! Apparently someone cancelled, I have a special request from my doctor to get the MRI done quickly, and to cap it off it took some skill over the phone to convince the lady that I really needed this exam soon (which is true by the way). So today, I am going to get it scanned, hopefully will have some results by next week. Let's hope it's noting serious and that I don't need surgery.
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I think that I will remember this day for all my life, as at around 22:30 in the night I might have broken the cruciate ligament of my right knee. The injury happened during a 5 a side football match, it's rather painful, had to run to the ER.
While there I realized how my problem was so small. Apparently someone run over a 14 year old kid, all the friends and family were there, and all of a sudden the mother run out screaming that his son was dead.
I can't describe the feeling, of course I didn't know those people but it was quite a shock, people kept coming up and down the corridor, crying, cussing, some of them could not believe what happened. You tend to imagine what would you do in a similar situation, but it's not easy, you are too rational if you are not involved.
It took 2 hours to get the knees looked at, at the moment there is nothing that I can do but put some ice, I'll have to fix a MRI and hope that it's nothing too serious. Still the though of that family it's a painful view, I hope that things will get better for them as well.
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Went to see Sin City in Varese. The movie theatre was rather disappointing, very small and with huge tents to cover windows on one side (but light was still sneaking under those). All in all the movie was very good, I really enjoyed watching it, especially as I used to read Miller's comics.
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I have got the inspiration from a post made by John recently where he was talking about his flight back to England for his viva. It made me think that I always travel by myself, and that it all became quite normal. This normalization scared me to be honest, I have never been like that before.
I couldn't stand be by myself, up to the point where I would go and see a friend so that "at least we are bored between the two of us!, as generally none us would know what to do.
Now I am fastened in my polished business class seat, overlooking other passengers that are sleeping or maybe watching a movie. I am always so utterly bored for 12 hours, I can't sleep so I watch movies, drink, eat, read, stretch. But nobody to speak to, nothing to look forward to. I feel that I have been deprived of the very nature of a trip: looking forward for what will happen once you arrive! After these 6 years spent traveling I have lost this enthusiasm, this is probably why I want to move again abroad, to get a new challenge, a new story to tell.
I remember a woman that Claire met when we were still together and she was living in Putney Bridge.
This woman left her highly paid job to open a cafeteria, as she couldn't stand the hot shot businesswoman life anymore. I guess it's nice to have money, lots of it, but where do you draw the line? I guess everything comes at a price, even high wages, but is mental sanity and humor stability worth it? I think that everyone has his/her own answer to the last question, I just hope I can find mine soon, the question is bugging me endlessly.
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After many years I get my window on the internet again (my Lox page at Reading is now history) thanks to the generosity of John Hawkins who took some time to explain how to use the CGI system, during a very nice but brief stay in Hiroshima. Thanks a lot John!

First task is to re-program the html so that this blog can look decent, I guess that nobody will see it "in the making" which is a good thing I guess...

A collection of all the articles that I have wrote so far, divided by month/year.

I have had the bad idea of writing my e-mail address on the board before, so this time I'll try to prevent some spam to get to me by putting this little image.. Let's hope it does the trick!

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A reminder to Myself

Left and right
Like day and night
That's what makes the world go round
In and out
Thin and stout
That's what makes the world go round

For every up there is a down
For every square there is a round
For every high there is a low
For every to there is a fro
To and fro
Stop and go
That's what makes the world go round

You must set your sights upon the heights
Don't be a mediocrity
Don't just wait and trust to fate
And say, that's how it's meant to be
It's up to you how far you go
If you don't try you'll never know
And so my lad as I've explained
Nothing ventured, nothing gained

You see my boy it's nature's way
Upon the weak the strong ones prey
The human life it's also true
The strong will try to conquer you
That is what you must expect
Unless you use your intellect
Brains and brawn, weak and strong
That's what makes the world go round